I think I may be able to help contribute to this. As I said before I trained with Benny when I was living in El Paso and we both received our blue belts from Relson Gracie in October of 2005. Benny was the partial owner of El Paso Jiujitsu as well as one of the instructors so he was on the mat around 6 days a week. By the time I left in December of 2006 he was probably pretty close to being a purple belt.
Benny's day job was as a school teacher and he coached wrestling at a few of the middle schools on the east side of the city, so between that and running the BJJ school his life pretty much revolved around grappling. With the exception of an injury that took him out for about a month in 06 he was always training.
I think that it also bears worth mentioning that before he even started training and BJJ he already had a blackbelt in a style free style jujitsu and had for some time. El Paso really didn't get an actual dedicated BJJ school until El Paso Jiujitsu opened in 2005, but there were several free-style jujitsu and submission wrestling place in town prior to that.

So you are saying he got a purple belt in one year....

Oct 2005 received blue belt

Dec. 2006 possibly close to purple belt= close to one year.

What is free style jujitsu? ....never heard of it and I can't find anything on it specifically in Texas on the internet.

What is free style jujitsu? ....never heard of it and I can't find anything on it specifically in Texas on the internet.

I don't know that he ever received a purple belt, but he had received three stripes on his blue belt from Martin Escobar in Tucson by that time while Benny was teaching at El Paso Jiu Jitsu. I've only had limited contact with him since his 2007 so I don't know if he continued with BJJ.
Freestyle jujitsu isn't really a style I guess; there were a few places in El Paso and Las Cruces that were teaching what amounts to judo + submission wrestling under the name jujitsu in the area and that's what all the grappling tourneys in the city were until 2007. Hayashi's and Bushido in El Paso were doing this as was Dragon's Den in Las Cruces. As to where Benny got his black belt in jujitsu prior to training in BJJ, I don't know.

Edit: I was looking trough his website and there is a picture of his 4th degree blackbelt certificate in Goshin Do Ryu Jiu Jitsu.

which may account for Benavides being listed on Team Rey Diogo's Pan Am roster. Rey Diogo is a part of Team Carlson Gracie, a very respected lineage. Why didn't Benavides keep up his association with Martin Escobar and perhaps become an affiliate?

I was looking trough his website and there is a picture of his 4th degree blackbelt certificate in Goshin Do Ryu Jiu Jitsu.

The caption under the picture reads, "Benny's Jiu Jitsu Certification." But if you squint real hard as you look at the fine print on the certificate, it appears to read "Ju Jitsu" instead of "Jiu Jitsu."

The caption under the picture reads, "Benny's Jiu Jitsu Certification." But if you squint real hard as you look at the fine print on the certificate, it appears to read "Ju Jitsu" instead of "Jiu Jitsu."

The caption under the picture reads, "Benny's Jiu Jitsu Certification." But if you squint real hard as you look at the fine print on the certificate, it appears to read "Ju Jitsu" instead of "Jiu Jitsu."

That doesn't matter. As I said before, Ju Jitus or Jiu Jitsu is all the same. Its all 柔術 regardless of the system of romanization used.

So you are saying he got a purple belt in one year....

Oct 2005 received blue belt

Dec. 2006 possibly close to purple belt= close to one year.

What is free style jujitsu? ....never heard of it and I can't find anything on it specifically in Texas on the internet.

I can see Purple in a year after blue if he was deeply invovled in grappling as Dempsey has pointed out.

Even if this Benny guy is frauduently using his Ju-Jitsu BB to pass it on as BJJ to get students there is nothing we can do about......some people have to honor so unless someone is going to go over there and beat his ass......lets just drop it and move on to more important things......I drove through El Paso and it is a **** hole. They can keep Benny and his Ju-Jistu, Jiu-Jistu or Free Style Jiu-Jitsu and he can even call himself Grandmaster for all I care.

Even if this Benny guy is frauduently using his Ju-Jitsu BB to pass it on as BJJ to get students there is nothing we can do about......some people have to honor so unless someone is going to go over there and beat his ass......lets just drop it and move on to more important things......I drove through El Paso and it is a **** hole. They can keep Benny and his Ju-Jistu, Jiu-Jistu or Free Style Jiu-Jitsu and he can even call himself Grandmaster for all I care.

My name is Ruben Marquez, I train under Master Benny. Just to make this clear. I am writing this on my own with influence from no one. I am a wrestling coach with 25 years of experience coaching both youth and high school levels, and both wrestle and train. I have read all the comments following this first post and I makes me laugh that grown men act so foolish and worry so much about bells and whistles and how pretty a building is or it's decor. All I can say is come check it out. (the training and techniques-what truly matters) I have made many an invitation to come and roll with benny and see for yourself you can be a black belt of any degree or lineage. From any name brand dojo, does not matter. Our new address is 6969 industrial inside dream arena. You can come in any time to free roll and you will be surprised that this 145 lbs older man will take it to you. With that said one of the Bennyism of Xtreem Jiu-Jitsu is roll to learn not to win. We are a no bully zone. Still the invitation stands. Oh and one last comment. Do not talk trash about people you don't even know. I'm sorry Master Benny but I could stay quiet no longer.